ASD Inclusion Or Bust

Hello all of you. There's one thing worth showing.

What you're looking at is a box of Latuda tablets used to treat Schizophrenia. And it's also been a year since I've stopped taking that medication after my diagnosis of Schizophrenia has been debunked by my latest psychiatrist and psychologist counselling sessions along with anxiety and depression. Those counselling sessions resulted in significant outcomes for myself that I'm not in any way some psychedelic person but someone who's thinking process is way outside the box not to mention the amount of imagination that's off the scales.

And this ladies and gentlemen is the strong highlight of an autistic person high on the spectrum such as myself. It'll be worth mentioning that I'm accepting my autism as more an intellectual superpower than a disability over the later years.

With all that, I'm embracing my nature with the series of artworks - not just paintings but drawings.

We'll take The Notorious Big Bass as the first example. The idea came about blending The Notorious B.I.G., a past American rapper and a largemouth bass inspired by the SEGA Bass Fishing Duel game on Playstation 2. From there, you catch a variety of largemouth bass ranging from small to super big sizes plus other fish species. With the concept of catching big bass, memorising the Notorious B.I.G. helped blend the both into what's called a juxtaposed similarity. 

And then, we'll go to The Almighty Gomibako which by the way is the Japanese word for rubbish bin (trash can in American English). That came about when I was participating in Japanese classes in my primary school years that every time each of us students are done, the teacher at the time tells us to put our rubbish into the gomibako. The word gomibako is stuck into my head until recently when I've decided to draw this up.

It's sort of too complex to explain to ordinary people, rather awkward but for some reason, anything I see and hear gets locked into my brain potentially clashing with anything else. Possibly blending similarities. This also helps my paintings emphasise specific meanings with some other artistic people I've came around mentioning some "neurodivergent influences". So that lights up my artistic niche. With my Instagram account, anyone can have a look at my artworks for themselves.

There are small things I can pick whereas other people wouldn't be able to.

There's this snippet from Kylie Minogue's Come Into My World music video. One particular thing anyone else would miss are the set of posters with "ENSEMBLE" dominant in them. This is a good piece of fascination after seeing that feature on Spicks and Specks, a music game show by the ABC where there are 2 teams of musicians and comedians contending with one another.

And with autistic people being structurally minded or relying on a structure, this isn't a bad thing. I find it helps navigate my way into a rather complex place but with the adequate amount of understanding, I can go step by step reaching to where I want to go. Here's this example.

What you're seeing here is part of Melbourne's metro rail system. This could certainly be mind boggling but once you understand the mechanics (such as knowing which stations to get off for your desired destinations), it can be straight forward. And trust me, I took metro trains many times and even other routes.

And finally, the whole metro train network including the city loop with the Parliament, Melbourne Central, Flagstaff, Southern Cross and Flinders Street stations among there. And further branching out are the regional V-Line train lines. The only thing that'll throw the spanner in the works is the new metro tunnel bypassing the city loop including the Richmond railway station. But with the expanding population and therefore the city loop under more than enough pressure, the metro tunnel will ease pressure with more efficient travels.

With that out of the way, I should mention the quirks that happen in my head back when I see and hear anything but clashes like I've explained earlier. I'll give you one example.

What you've watched is the TAC's eScooter safety ad campaign (Traffic Accident Commission for short) highlighting the dangers of misusing eScooters in public. Although serious, there's an odd similarity that's stuck in my mind and that is anything Robot Chicken. This is one bit I can show.

But then, there's another matter of people. And fortunately, I've been able to meet other people on the same spectrum as I am when I can get to know and feel more comfortable about myself and better fitting with those kind of people. We have decent strengths being logical, being structural, creative and having our own imaginations that are out of this world but for a long time, we still have troubles not being accepted into the general public. Mainly due to ignorance and I know this too well. Although we're not greatly sociable, we do have capabilities to make our world a better place and more fascinating.

If we can see Greta Thunberg, a Swedish climate activist but also living with Aspergers, she has no tolerance seeing our planet being wrecked by natural disasters caused by climate change. Her fear has turned her to take drastic actions with one fascinating event.

This here is the movement Greta created. The School Strike 4 Climate in 2018 when she was 15 years old. Since then, more school students around the world followed suit demanding politicians to get serious on tackling greenhouse gas emissions. And then, children are our future. Aren't they?

With that, Greta Thunberg has received great praise by the likes of Sir David Attenborough but hated by a handful of right-winged journalists and Donald Trump.

There are certain things Greta does and I have done and can do that helps with the environment which is limiting waste. Things like using our everyday items until they stop working rather than regularly upgrading to anything new and also, this reduces the amount of raw materials being dug up and releasing toxic waste materials into our environment and with it, potentially getting into our bodies causing illnesses and some certain disabilities.

Let's not forget our environment is a beautiful thing giving us life for generations to come.

Despite Raymond Babbit from Rain Man, there are some autistic people who've been able to break into the entertainment industry. There's Hannah Gadsby who's a comedian and then, there's the actress who caught my eye which is Chloe Hayden courtesy of the Sunday Herald Sun.

As I read the article about her, it's assuring that Chloe accepts her autism despite challenge we all face that still won't go away. But will it? It's hard to say. Even though I utilise my autism to better help any bit to keep our lives ticking and to help shape my future, elsewhere are ignorant and too slow to take the spectrum seriously. And getting a new job is still challenging even though I have years of work experience but for future employment, it can feel as though anything's up in the air.

However, I've been working out what skills I can use for new jobs and even, another industries. I came to the point I do need help if the jobs market gets too overwhelming. Will I need to study or so fourth? There are challenges that can leave me burnt out as autistic people encounter that moment and after don't have enough energy to think.

But anyway, I've been privileged to become an Aspergers Victoria member since January this year and meeting up with other people on the same spectrum has been insightful enabling me to have chances to share experiences, strategies, what we're into and hopefully open to new pathways for appropriate jobs, likelihood of building better friendships and perhaps dating.

One of the things that's new to me is autism masking when an Aspergers Victoria member brought that up. It involves any person on the autism spectrum pretending to act like other people to better fit in with the general public but that can be a bad thing as they'll have to put pressure on themselves to be like others when they're not. There were times I had to do this but there weren't many options otherwise. Luckily, I've been more aware and I understood and accept myself for who I am. For the likes of Justin Bieber, not great.

This is just a random comparison but it's worth emphasising in the entertainment industry particularly pop music, those people would have to be made to change their appearances, make as many songs as possible for every new album to be played heavily in commercial radio all around the world. What started with Justin Bieber being incredibly cute then raking in enormous amounts of money and building up a massive fanbase until fame became a curse for him.

If anyone else would understand the incredible amount of pressure being in the entertainment industry being the magical figure, it can be hard for the people in the industry. With my fortes I have, I've been able to fit in with society in certain ways as long as they're pathways.

But unlike Justin Bieber, systemic and societal problems can hinder autistic people their abilities to fit in not matter how successful they are to be worthy citizens. And believe me. I even grew firm attitudes towards issues such as narrow-minded thinking, all other wrongs in society and politics, people troubles past and present and ongoing frustrations just trying to do anything particularly in civilisation. We should all know that we're not necessarily the problem, the problem is the rest of society that aren't educated enough but even the country are recognising autism and more discussions that go with it, the gap seems to be closing slowly. Perhaps too slow.

On top of all this, if we can do things other people can with additional thinking and planning capabilities, why can't we all be included?

I do mean business and it's a blessing having other people who respect me which I just need in order to be a citizen. No ifs, no buts. See you next time!